“Then I don’t see how you can help me,” Galler said. “I need supporters who are above reproach.”
Heikki took a deep breath, and caught her brother’s shoulder, spinning him back to face her. “Get one thing straight, little brother. I am above reproach. We are professionals, we do not break laws, and we don’t cut corners. The Licensing Board, or even the cops, can investigate until doomsday, and they won’t find anything that isn’t faked—obviously faked. Is that clear?”
Galler nodded, but did not look particularly convinced. Heikki turned away, angry with herself for losing her temper, and unlocked the grill that barred the private entrances. The door to the flat opened before she could lay her hand against the lock, and Santerese beckoned her in.
“I heard you yelling outside,” she said, with a shadow of her normal smile.
“I’m sorry, Marshallin,” Heikki said, and stepped into the familiar room, Galler at her shoulder. A drinks tray was resting on the side table, two filled glasses waiting. A third stood half-empty on the monitor console, and a fourth—also half-empty—on the sideboard beside the door to the workroom. Heikki’s eyes narrowed, but before she could say anything, an enormous figure poked its head out of the doorway. If he had been a little smaller, and darker, he could have been Nkosi’s twin; as it was, he bore an uncomfortable resemblance to one of the shaggier terrestrial bears. He looked like a clown, Heikki thought, torn between laughter and shrieking fury, and drew breath to say something she would certainly regret. Before she could speak, however, the big man said cheerfully, “Good to see you, Heikki. And you, ser, must be the lady’s all too elusive brother.” His tone changed abruptly. “You are Galler Heikki?”
Galler hesitated, and Heikki said, flatly, “Yes, this is Galler.” She looked at her brother. “And this is Idris Max, who last time I knew him was with the Transit Police.”
“Oh, I’ve been promoted since then,” Max said genially. He always had been impervious to insult, Heikki remembered. She looked at Santerese.
“I thought you told me everything was all right.”
“As far as I knew, it was.” Santerese looked at Max. “Unless you’ve changed your plans?”
Max smiled. “Not at all. But there is a query out for him.”
“Which is not the same thing as an advice of arrest,” Galler murmured, just loudly enough to be heard.
“Very true,” Max said. “However, I am obliged to ask you a few questions.”
Heikki looked again at Santerese. “Marshallin, why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”
Santerese made a face. “Doll, I wish I knew. When I got word that a formal investigation was being launched, I put Malachy on the legal aspects, and—since I had to admit you were probably right about Lo-Moth screwing us on this one—I started to work on the tapes you sent me. I also got back in touch with your ex-boyfriend here.” She nodded to Max, who bowed.
“He never was,” Heikki said.
Santerese grinned. “Whatever you say, doll. Anyway, I figured if anybody had the connections we needed, it would be him. So here he is, and here you are.”
“What did you find on the tapes?” Heikki asked.
“Now that,” Max interrupted, “was the most interesting thing about all of this mess.” He lumbered over to the drinks tray, and scooped up one of the glasses. He passed it to Heikki, who stared for an instant in fascination at the delicate goblet clutched in the enormous paw before accepting it.
“It’s that bad?” she said aloud.
“The crystal matrix was destroyed at the wreck site,” Santerese said.
Heikki swore, and did not bother to apologize. That was, in her opinion, the least likely of all the possible results—but on the other hand, if Galler was right, if Lo-Moth’s new matrix wasn’t new at all, but was derived from the same research that had produced the flawed crystal that had destroyed EP1. . What else could the pirates do with it? It couldn’t be sold, and it certainly couldn’t be kept—and the pirates couldn’t’ve been the usual run of hired thugs, she realized abruptly. They had to be company men, trusted men, because otherwise there would be too many opportunities for blackmail….
“This is making sense to you,” Max said, and the buffoonery was gone from his voice. “Give.”
Heikki took a deep breath, marshalling her thoughts, but before she could say anything, Galler spoke. “Wait a minute, Gwynne.” His voice was brittle, amused. “Before you start talking to the—authorities—I think there are a couple of questions you should be asking.”
“Ask away,” Max said.
“First, what’s the status of this investigation of yours?” Galler glanced at Heikki. “You see, I’m not entirely selfish. And what’s my status—ser?”
“Commissioner,” Max said affably. Heikki lifted an eyebrow. The change in title represented a considerable promotion since the last time she had seen Max. “The investigation is proceeding—though right now I’m more interested in why we were put on the job than in the trumped-up Violations’ we’ve been shown.” He smiled at Heikki. “Not at all your style, Heikki.” He looked back at Galler. “As for you, ser…. As they say, that depends in large part on how you choose to answer my questions.”
“I see.” Galler managed a wry smile, and reached for the last drink left on the tray.
Max seated himself on the largest of the chairs and leaned back, still smiling benignly. “Now, as I said, this all seems to make sense to you two. Why don’t you explain it all to me?”
Heikki looked at her brother, unable to keep an unholy joy from her face. “Galler knows so much more,” she said sweetly. “I think he’d better explain this one.”
It took perhaps half an hour for Galler to outline what he had found in Tremoth’s files and Slade’s reaction to his discoveries. When he had finished, Heikki spoke, explaining her contract with Lo-Moth and the work she had done on Iadara. Max sat quietly through it all, eyes hooded, leaning back comfortably as though he were listening to children’s tales. When they had both finished, he sat quietly for a moment, staring at nothing then shook himself, looking up with an abstracted smile.
“So sorry, but I was just thinking, this might explain a couple of bodies that turned up one one of the lower levels of EP10 last week—Tremoth employees who’d broken their contracts and gone underground. Or so their bosses said, even though the grieving widows claimed they were company men to the last molecule.”
“The hijack crew?” Heikki said.
“By coincidence, they were last seen on Iadara,” Max said. “Oceanic survey work, officially.”
Definitely the hijackers, Heikki thought, but said nothing. Iadara’s oceans were effectively useless for any of Lo-Moth’s products; they weren’t even terribly useful as a food supply. She shook the memory away, and said to Max, “So now what?”
Max shook his head. “You tell me. It might interest you to know, by the way, that Slade’s been giving money to Retroceder politicians and action groups.”
“I thought he was a Retroceder,” Heikki said, and Galler made a little noise of satisfaction. Max pointed a finger at him. “You claimed you had information from Tremoth’s files. Where is it?”
Galler made a face. “It was in my office, in the reader there.” Max raised an eyebrow in polite disbelief, and Galler said, stung, “Well, in my experience, no one ever looks at the tapes in the reader, they search the files and the strongbox and all that. It was the safest place I could think of on short notice. I was planning to recover them, anyway, take them back to my pied-a-terre, but things moved a little faster than I was expecting. I set things up so that Gwynne—”
“Gwynne?” Max said, chortling. Heikki waved him to silence, all too aware of the color mounting in her cheeks.